After a 20 percent fare hike for public transit was announced last week in Brazil, hundreds of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets.
What initially started as a response to the fare hikes has grown into a larger movement of 100,000 Brazilians demonstrating against the government, and protesters now feel the new fare increase is bleeding the people dry to pay for infrastructure upgrades in advance for the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Summer Olympics.
On Wednesday, the Mayor of Rio de Janeiro, Eduardo Paes, confirmed that the transit fare will be reduced from R$ 2.95 to R$ 2.75 in response to the people’s protest.
Eliane Cantanhêde, a columnist for the newspaper Folha de São Paulo and TV commentator for Globo News em Pauta, joins us to discuss Brazil’s economic disparities and the many ways this protest could play out.
Click here for a short video clip of the mass protests in Brazil.
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